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(Prayer and Meditation)
Dedicated to the Practice and Discovery of Christian thought, Prayer and Meditation.
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The Joy of the Lord is our Strength
One way the enemy seeks to destroy us is to magnify our troubled experiences. Circumstances may cause us to walk a mile, but it’s the enemy that put splinters in our feet alone that journey. Satan does not care how he weakens us, be it small or large, physical, emotional, or financial, as long as he can infect us with the disease of wrong thinking, as long as he can affect our experiences in such a way that it causes us to question God’s love for us, as long as he can take our joy which is our strength, satan is happy in seeing us unhappy.
Happiness comes from what happens in our life, and when we perceive it good we are happy. However Joy, comes from the Lord, and Joy is expressed not only when things go well, but also when tribulations and extreme tragedies come into our life.
And when we allow Satan to invade our minds with doubt and hopelessness and depression, we become like a beaten prize fighter in the 10th round of a championship fight, wondering if they can make it through the last two rounds of our spiritual battle or even worse, wondering if it’s even worth going on. Weary in well doing, we no longer desire, to fight to keep our marriage, we’ve lost hope in our financial condition, we’re no longer believing God for a healing of a chronic sickness, we become drained by the troubles of our family and friends, and to make matters worse, the church elders and those that should be counseling us out of our mess are telling us for some forsaken reason we are not living up to the expectations God has for our lives. And before we realize it, we have allowed the enemy to steal our joy, or in truth we’ve given our joy away.
However, Philippians 4:4 says “Rejoice in the Lord always and again I say rejoice” this is not by accident that this verse is written as it is. God wants us to rejoice! Even in those times when we just don’t feel like rejoicing, because He knows that our rejoicing in Him is strength. This is why James 1:2 says “…count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations” God knows that it is the joy in Him that strengthens us and draws us into a deeper relation with Him.
Habakkuk 3:17-18(Amp)
Though the fig tree does not blossom and there is no fruit on the vines, [though] the product of the olive fails and the fields yield no food, though the flock is cut off from the fold and there are no cattle in the stalls, Yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will exult in the [victorious] God of my salvation
Even though Judah was going through starvation and drought, Habakkuk had no intentions of being defeated. They were poor and did not have the resources for success, but Habakkuk did not mumble or complain about the circumstances.
Often we say we have a victory in God but we walk around looking defeated by just because we can’t figure a way out. Just because everything is going wrong, and sometimes everything will go wrong! We cannot be defeated we must put our confidence not on the circumstances but in God.
Habakkuk refused to be defeated he had read the story of Job and was ok with troubles knowing that God is a rewarder, he read the psalms and knew that if God be for him who could be against him. The confidence in God expressed by Habakkuk would be the precursor to Nehemiah’s statement the Joy of the Lord is our Strength. Habakkuk knew full well the power that comes from having God as your joy. Now when we go to verse 19 we see why Habakkuk was sent to encourage the remnants of Judah, he professes;
Habakkuk 3:19 (Amp) The Lord God is my Strength, my personal bravery, and my invincible army; He makes my feet like hinds' feet and will make me to walk [not to stand still in terror, but to walk] and make [spiritual] progress upon my high places [of trouble, suffering, or responsibility]!
Habakkuk had an attitude of victory, he wasn’t going to be defeated, the odds against him was not important, his lack of resources wasn’t important, his hunger pains wasn’t even important, but his confidence in the renewed strength he would attain through the praising of God was the only thing that made a difference. Habakkuk had real Joy in the lord, and it was his strength. If he was here today, he would say,
“I’m flat broke and been jobless for over a year, no money in my pocket, no food on my table, and I don’t know how these bill will get paid. I spend all day long at the free clinic, but the pain is only getting worst; my children are on drugs, gay, strung out and my spouse doesn’t seem to give a crap what I’m going through.
Yet will I rejoice, even though I’m going through all this, I will rejoice in the Lord, no matter what my circumstance are I will be joyful in God my Savior, regardless of what’s going on in my life.
So often we get stuck in our depression we mope, sulk and feel sorry for ourselves, but God wants us to rejoice in Him, to praise Him, worship Him, not in thought, but in action. God wants us to sing, dance, and give testimony of His great works, publicly, hat His Joy may strengthen us. We must see rejoicing in God as action, a thing that can be seen, not an emotion that is felt. Therefore saints, Rejoice in the lord always, and again I say, Rejoice!
Troy “FireSpeaks” Pearsall
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Your Brother in Christ Troy "FireSpeaks" Pearsall
When We can't See God’s Work at Hand.
Your brother in Christ Troy
in season and out of season
2 Timothy 4:1-2
I charge thee therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom; [2] Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.
God has only required us to give the gospel, at two times; the first is in season, and the second is out of season. But sometimes when it’s out of season we forget the power of the Gospel which makes the time always the right time to reveal Jesus to those that don’t know him.
We think within ourselves, “They don’t want to hear about my Jesus” they will never accept what I have to tell them” But the issue is not does he want to hear about Jesus, it is does he need to hear about Jesus? Moreover Jesus never said to anyone “You good and successful servant” did he?
Psalm 19:7 say “ The Law of the Lord is Perfect is converting souls” what that tells us is that it is not you and I that convert people’s heart to God but God’s law. Therefore we must give God’s word both in season and out of season, taking no responsibility or accolades for getting someone to receive Jesus Christ as their savior. Jesus did not ask us to become “Good and Successful servants, he required us to be good and obedient servants, and that means giving the gospel in season and out season.
Take a moment to look at the video *
(below)of this woman and how she used the word of God to change a life out of season
Also I would appreciate your comments
Looking Away Toward Jesus
Psalm 36:9 For with thee is the fountain of life: in thy light shall we see light. 
More times then not men and women who truly love God seek Holiness by their own hands. They say to themselves “Because I love God I must stop (whatever sin they have) and give my life totally to God.” And this is a very honorable desire to give your life for God totally. The problem arise in the misconception that we can consecrate ourselves to God. One example of this self-consecration is called introspective. With introspective we survey all the events of our day keeping what we think is of God and letting go of the things which are not, vowing to repent from the sins of that day. The problem with this method is that we leave the knowledge of good and bad to be discerned by our own heart and mind. But psalm 19:12 asks “Who can discern his errors” not one of us, because even if it is our will to do the right thing our heart will not allow us to, it will lie to us, and confuse us into believing we are holy in action when in fact we have become hypocrites in our attempt to be close to God. Jeremiah 17:9 The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? More importantly when we seek to judge our actions through introspective we are looking inward toward ourselves for answers. But Hebrews 12:2 says “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith” the Amplified Bible give a much better understanding of this simple yet ever so powerful verse it says “Looking away [from all that will distract] to Jesus” Here is the power in this verse looking away from self to Jesus. Here is a very quick fable that may better illuminate what I'm trying to say.
There was a centipede and a frog talking, when the frog asked “which of your one hundred feet moves first when you walk? How do you know which to move next?” the centipede realized that he did not know which foot moved first and when he tried he could not even move just one foot so he became angry and left. “I’m leaving he said,” but when he tried to leave his mind was on his feet and he was stuck right where he was unable to move forward at all. The centipede loved to bath in the sunlight on his favorite leaf so when the noon sun came without thinking he ran over to his favorite leaf to rest, completely forgetting to analyze which foot to move first. This is true of us saints when we look toward our situation, circumstances, even try to introspectively analyze the events of the day we get stuck, our mind and heart becomes deceitful beyond cure and we can no longer grow in our walk with Christ. Oh but when we look away from all that will distract us to Jesus, who is the resurrection, then by his light (understanding from the Holy Spirit) we shall have light . Psalms 36:9 (KJV) For with thee is the fountain of life: in thy light shall we see light. In the Above verse the fountain is God, (Lord Jesus Christ) as an independent self sufficient spring; a spring by which all creatures of life proceeds. By Him alone are they sustained, and through Him alone can it be perfected, nothing of our own hands. Life is in the creature, but the fountain is only in the Creator. Therefore the knowledge of God sheds a light on all other subjects, and presents to us an understanding that goes beyond all that can humanly be understood. However in the natural we will never see Jesus, nor obtain any measure of holiness by the light of self, but by the light of all things that are within our understanding in the light of Jesus. No inward introspective of ours deeds will bring about holiness; our heart is an evil and deceptive thing which none can cure, so what we think is good, is left up to our heart to measure. However our heart can not be trusted nor our mind, which has been locked shut by and evil and deceitful heart. Setting our mind to do anything to attain holiness is foolish; it is our vanity, piety, egotism, haughtiness, and hate will deceive us into believing that we are doing what is right, or what we are doing is God’s Will. Even if we could attain holiness by our own hands how would God get the Glory? It is the Holy Ghost which lights up the darkest recesses of our heart's ungodliness. If we would but fix our eyes on Christ Jesus then we would, (if it pleases God) obtain one ray of light from the throne of God, which is better than the noonday splendor of illumination created by the wisdom of our own deceitful heart and carnal mind. leave your comment below 
Tears of Intercession
by Troy Pearsall 
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